Welcome to the new Murder She Writes!

This redesign has been awhile in the making. Two programmers, testing, a lot of back-and-forth, and it’s not *quite* done, but we wanted to launch it anyway because it’s almost there. This is the third major re-do for our blog, but after over 7 years, it seems time. In November of 2005, Murder She Writes launched with five authors; the last two remaining from the original bunch are me and Karin Tabke. At different times, we’ve considered pulling the plug — between families and writing deadlines (and Karin even has an outside business she’s run for more than 20 years) sometimes the blog seemed to be a chore when it used to be so much fun. But when we really thought about it, we realized that we’d miss this community, we’d miss chatting, we’d miss the fuel for our muses. Sometimes, writing a short article like we do for the blog helps cleanse the creative palette, so to speak. So we’re back and re-committed to providing you a glimpse into the writer’s life, as well as lots of other fun and goodies

What do we have for you? Hopefully a neater, cleaner, more streamlined page that you’ll enjoy visiting every morning with your coffee, or every evening with your wine. We’re in the process of cataloging our old posts into our new categories to help make what you’re looking for easier to find. We have a new host so that hopefully, we won’t experience any down time that had plagued us last year. And we have some new features!

First, the daily blog is at the top. It’ll be easy to see because it takes up two columns right under the rotating picture. The rotating picture will highlight the last five featured blogs as well, so if you missed a day, you’ll easily see what you missing. Below that are two columns of the last ten blogs we’ve had. Another easy way to see if you’ve missing something you don’t want to miss! We felt that it was much cleaner to have a paragraph and then click-through to read more, than to scroll through long blocks of text.

Contests & Promotions: Any of our individual or group contests will be posted here.

Fashion & Fitness: Need I say more?

Food & Dining: Some of our bloggers are amazing cooks … and yes, we all love food. Some of us (me) too much!

Home Decor & Design: Inspired by Deb Webb’s remodel, we love talking about homes, architecture, what we’d love to do someday …

Love, Life & All That Jazz: If it doesn’t fit anywhere else, it’s here.

Writing & Publishing Tips: If you’re a writer, this is the section for you!

Writing Life: What does it mean to be a writer? To be creative? To juggle career and family? A day in the life … or the life of … you’ll see what makes us tick (or what makes us crazy!)

You can also more easily subscribe to the Murder She Writes twitter and facebook pages, and if you click on our author photos, you’ll see our new release and links to our webpage and personal social media.

One new feature we’re launching that I’m particularly excited about … Murder HE Writes. One day every two weeks we’ll be hosting a favorite male suspense writers as our special guest. I can hardly wait to announce the first guest! It’ll always be a surprise, so check back in two weeks and see who we have for you up first!

There are still some glitches here and there that we’ll be fixing over the coming week. We really hope you like our new design and format. To launch the new look, we’re running a rare Murder She Writes contest. Anyone who comments on this post or any post this month will be entered into a drawing. FIVE winners will be randomly selected to win a books from us–you’ll get a minimum of THREE autographed books. (If you’re outside the US or Canada, you’ll receive a $20 gift card to the major bookstore of your choice.) If you comment every day from now through February 28, that’s 10 “chances” to win! We wanted to say thank you for all your support and loyalty through the years. And if you’re new? Welcome! We hope to be here for many more years.

I’ll be answering questions here all day. And if you have a topic you’d like one of us to blog about, please let us know. Or if a past blog has really resonated with you, let us know that, too!

Allison Brennan is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of nearly three dozen romantic thrillers and mysteries, including the Lucy Kincaid series and the Max Revere series. She lives in Northern California with her husband, five children, and assorted pets.

Ooooh, spiffy new redesign! Now I can avoid writing my dissertation catch up on my MSW news over my morning oatmeal in extra style. Checking the blog is the first thing I do when I wake up long before the crack of dawn– makes my day! Looking forward to those male suspense authors… despite the fact that my TBR queue is already epic and that I really should be reading loads of science papers to write my dissertation, one can never be exposed to too many legend authors! 🙂

I love the new look and functionality of the site. You guys (gals) always do such a great job of relating info to those of us who aspire to be writers, while still making it relevant to anyone who stumbles across the site. I think this will continue to help you all in that regard. Awesome!

It’ll take some getting used to to be sure, but I’m probably going to keep on following you guys, even tho Toni (the reason I came to here and Murderati in the first place) is no longer technically a part of the site.

Also, will there be more authors in general (i.e. maybe branching out a tad from the suspense genre) who will be showcased here? That would be interesting to say the least.

Oh i like the re-do! I admit i haven’t been around as much as i used to be but i’m working full time now and time is not as plentiful anymore. Murder She Writes is still on my blog roll on my blog so hopefully it brings people on over here. Always enjoy the posts. Can’t wait to see who you first guy writer is going to be. My hubby reads a lot of the guy written suspense/thriller books. Be nice to share something with him.

Looks good. Love the background photo too! Having the categories will help when going back to find a post where something was mentioned ( like a new author and book). Love the ideas of sharing recipes as well.

Oh…it’s pretty. Love the new categories you guys have too. I’m so glad you’ll have tuff from the old site archived. I have me very one memories, and one posts tht really resonate with me fom there. Fingers crossed I don’t end up in moderation jail with this one 🙂 if I do, can someone be a dear and free me…pretty please!

I’m glad you said whose bookcase it was, although I can’t tell what kind of books she likes to read. Mine are stuffed to the gills, too. I usually put one row of books in the back and one in front on a single shelf. I don’t rearrange furniture like some people do, but every once in a while I rearrange my bookcases — one shelf at a time.

Hi I am so grateful I found your blog page, I really found you by accident, while I was browsing on Google for something else, Anyways I am here now
and would just like to say thanks for a tremendous post
and a all round thrilling blog (I also love the theme/design),
I don’t have time to read through it all at the moment but I have saved
it and also added in your RSS feeds, so when I have time I will be back to read more,
Please do keep up the fantastic job.

Featured on murder she writes

Bio:

Allison Brennan

Allison Brennan is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of nearly three dozen romantic thrillers and mysteries, including the Lucy Kincaid series and the Max Revere series. She lives in Northern California with her husband, five children, and assorted pets.